The country is moving out of the eco­nomic crisis and showing signs of growth in key areas, though crit­ical chal­lenges remain for busi­nesses and con­sumers, said Brian Moynihan, chief exec­u­tive officer of Bank of America, at North­eastern University’s CEO Break­fast forum on Tuesday.

“We had a tough eco­nomic decline, but the good news is the United States and Mass­a­chu­setts are recov­ering,” said Moynihan, the forum’s keynote speaker.

Northeastern’s CEO Break­fast forums rec­og­nize leading CEOs who are invited to speak to an audi­ence of other chief exec­u­tive offi­cers and senior exec­u­tives from the Greater Boston area. The pro­gram is rec­og­nized as one of the leading forums in the country.

In his opening remarks, Moynihan hailed Northeastern’s co-​​op pro­gram, which he said has had a strong impact on Amer­ican busi­nesses and blos­somed glob­ally under the lead­er­ship of Pres­i­dent Joseph E. Aoun. Later, Aoun thanked Moynihan and pre­sented him with a globe — rep­re­senting both Moynihan’s status as a “global cit­izen” and Northeastern’s con­tin­uing com­mit­ment to expand its inter­na­tional presence.

“The busi­ness sector has been pretty remark­able,” Moynihan added. “We went through the most serious eco­nomic crisis since the Great Depres­sion, and busi­nesses came through it.”

How­ever, Moynihan said busi­nesses remain cau­tious about invest­ments and bor­rowing due to uncer­tainty about con­sumer trends and reg­u­la­tions, while over­seas mar­kets in areas such as Asia and Latin America are becoming more attrac­tive for Amer­ican businesses.

Moynihan added that housing issues and the fore­clo­sure crisis are “the last part of the cycle” that the nation and the banking industry as a whole are working to solve. He said lending insti­tu­tions have col­lec­tively mod­i­fied 4 mil­lion home mort­gages since 2008, including 850,000 at Bank of America. How­ever, he said delin­quent mort­gages con­tinue to be an area of concern.

Bank of America, he said, has taken other steps to soften the blow for con­sumers. These include expanding regional cen­ters nation­wide for cus­tomers to speak face-​​to-​​face with bank rep­re­sen­ta­tives, donating prop­erty to cities in need, and a mort­gage mod­i­fi­ca­tion pro­gram specif­i­cally for U.S. mil­i­tary members.

Moynihan took over as Bank of America’s pres­i­dent and CEO in Jan­uary 2010. Bank of America is one of the world’s largest finan­cial insti­tu­tions, serving indi­vidual con­sumers, small– and middle-​​market busi­nesses and large cor­po­ra­tions with a full range of banking, investing, asset man­age­ment and other finan­cial and risk man­age­ment prod­ucts and services.

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About the Writer

Greg St. Martin is a senior editor for news@Northeastern in the Office of Marketing and Communications. He joined Northeastern in March 2010 after working at the Boston Metro newspaper for six years. Outside of work, he enjoys playing basketball, congratulating himself on finding great parking spots in the city, and listening to the comic genius of Steven Wright. He lives in Newton, Massachusetts, with his wife and daughter.

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